A conventional locking system most generally provides a single locking point between two structures, such as a file drawer relative to the cabinet in which the file drawer is disposed, a door relative to its door frame, and so on. Examples of such locking systems include a deadbolt lock or a lockable door knob for doors, or a locking cylinder (for example, key-actuated) that drives a bar or pin into a locking position for obstructing, for example, a drawer from being opened.
It is also conventionally known to operate several locking points in unison from a central location, such as using a single key to lock multiple file drawers in a vertical filing cabinet at the same time. However, such locking systems usually require a restrictive degree of proximity or alignment or both between the locking points (and, thus, between the elements being locked such as the drawers in this example). For example, a conventional single key lock for multiple drawers in a filing cabinet uses a linearly elongate bar or other rigid member that generally extends or spans across all of the drawers and is selectively moved between locked and unlocked positions by actuation of the key. Such restrictions as to proximity and/or alignment in conventional lock systems limit their usefulness if the required locking positions are distant from one another and/or are spaced apart in several dimensions.